556
The Green Bag
Cushing was deeply hurt, but had consolation in the support of men like Charles Sumner, who went on record as saying: — "I have absolute confidence in Caleb Cushing." And yet Cushing had strongly opposed Sumner when a candidate for the United States Senate in 1851, char acterizing him as a "one-idealed aboli tionist." In his address before the Grafton & Coos Bar Association, from which I have already quoted, Mr. Chandler said: — I shall always deeply mourn because the jurist best fitted of all to adorn the chief-justice ship of the United States, and who was actually nominated for the position, was most foolishly and without reason denied a confirmation by the Senate, and the nation thus deprived of the services at that exalted post of the one person whose legal training, wide learning, keen sense of justice, and great capacity for full investiga tion and wise and impartial decision, would have made for him, if his life had been long spared, the equal of the great John Marshall.
Had this nomination been made thirty years later, it would probably have been confirmed. The name of Williams being rejected and that of Cushing withdrawn, the nomination fell, as the late Judge Hoar wittily remarked, "to that favorite of the law, an innocent third party," Morrison R. Waite of Ohio, Mr. Cushing's junior at Geneva. What ought to be our judgment of Cushing as a man, and as a lawyer? The most trustworthy evidence on which to base a sound judgment of his eminence, worth and integrity as a law yer is the testimony of his professional brethren whom he met in the fierce contests at the bar; and the best evi dence of his uprightness and worth as a citizen is the testimony of his fellow townsmen and neighbors among whom the greater part of his life was spent.
The bar of the United States Supreme Court met in Washington on January 10, 1879, to honor Cushing's memory. Leadng lawyers from different parts of the United States were in attendance, and William M. Evarts of New York pre sided. A committee on resolutions was appointed, which included AttorneyGeneral Charles Devens and Roscoe Conkling. In concluding an address of discriminating eulogy, Attorney-General Devens presented the following resolu tion : — Resolved, That while the memory of Caleb Cushing deserves to be cherished as a citizen and a soldier, as a scholar and a historian, as a statesman and a diplomatist, the bar desires to especially remember him today as a wise legis lator, as an accomplished publicist, and as a pro found and learned lawyer, whose services in all these capacities have been most honorable to himself and most valuable to the Republic.
Speaking through Mr. Chief Justice Waite, the Court accepted the resolution "with cordial approval," the Chief Justice stating that the resolution and the remarks by Attorney-General Devens were "no more than was due to the occasion." There is not the slightest reason to doubt either the competency of these distinguished lawyers to sit in accurate judgment upon Caleb Cushing's char acter as a lawyer, statesman, and citizen, or the sincerity or honesty of their judg ment as expressed in a resolution entered upon the records of the court for the benefit of posterity. At this meeting of the Supreme Court bar Mr. Albert Pike, a prominent law yer, delivered a eulogy from which I quote : — Cushing served the country and his other clients faithfully and fearlessly. Nor did any reproach through him ever come upon the profession; for he never forgot either its duties, proprieties, amenities or courtesies. He was a man, ambitious no doubt, not re-
